UGG x Xylem

Most days, we get calls from dozens of people needing a single pedestal.

A few weeks ago, we got a call from one person who needed hundreds.

We’ve had the pleasure and joy of working with Ugg (you know, the footwear company famous for these boots) on retail displays over the last few years, but this order of theirs was a little different.

They needed 360 clear acrylic pedestals and risers for their big spring sales event—the launch of their upcoming seasonal line—to which they invite all of their distributors, customers and friends.

Acrylic pedestals—made out of the same material as plexiglass—are one of our top sellers. Elegant, modern, and a lot more durable than they look, our acrylic pedestals are fully customizable, available in several colors with various lighting options. The clear option Ugg ordered has an airy, open look that gives your product or art piece a feel of floating.

On the production side, making 360 pedestals is almost the same as making a single unit, though with an order this size the name of the game is: Logistics. As a lean manufacturing company, we make everything to order, so the first step was confirming we could source the materials in time to meet a tight timeline. With so many customers in the trade show or event space, we don’t mess around when it comes to deadlines—we meet them, or we go extinct… so we always meet them.

One of our disciplines to keep on track is The Pre-mortem: a group huddle to anticipate potential issues with a project before we start cutting and to establish daily production benchmarks, ensuring there are no surprises. We also work on a one-piece flow, building one piece from start to finish instead of working in large batches. If there’s a defect somewhere along the line, we catch it on the first pedestal, stop production, and fix the problem in real time on Pedestal No. 1 rather than on No. 360.

We had four guys on this project for 10 days and we’re happy to say we got every last one shipped out with time to spare. And as our mentor Toyota says, “Quality, or nothing at all.”